Physx Only on CPU(Not GPU!)

[Bob.]

This is part rant part informative for people with PhysX cards
(Please note that i love CDPR and the world they've created in Withcer 3, but gosh with this whole graphics incident and now this PhysX situation I can't help but feel ticked off)

Informative:
-Witcher 3 has "PhysX"
-But its run primarily on the CPU
-Having a dedicated PhysX card will do nothing, it won't even be used

Rant:
So Witcher 3 has this beautiful "PhysX" system that honestly makes it look gorgeous, the problem is is that its not even run, primarily, on the GPU. They could have added an option to allow it to be used on a dedicated physx card, increasing performance. My dedicated PhysX card is sitting there unused. Honestly it really pisses me off.

Please post if you agree, disagree, or to let me know on some point i've missed out on

Edit:
The part about the being able to disable physX was addresed in the comments below so I decided to edit the original rant.

Original rant:
Rant:
So Witcher 3 has this beautiful "PhysX" system that honestly makes it look gorgeous, the problem is is that its not even run, primarily, on the GPU, it boggles me that Nvidiia would even say this is PhysX in the normal sense. And it really bugs me becuase i'm running the game on a 970, but I also have 770 dedicated to Physx just sitting there. If i try and turn on PhysX my FPS is significantly less, but i miss out on those awesome physics. Honestly it really pisses me off.

[MeowCats]

It's annoying me aswell, i've got a 750Ti along my 780Ti's as Dedicated PhysX GPU as it doesn't need any PCI-E 6 or 8 pin power.. but it's sitting there doing nothing in the Witcher 3. An nvidia powered game? there's nothing Nvidia Exclusive at all in this game.. and PhysX can't be turned off at all.. or offloaded to a GPU.

[Bob.]

If CDPR could implement a feature switching it back to dedicated PhysX cards, I would be a very happy camper, but until then i'll be a bit angry

[MeowCats]

Originally posted by Bob:

If CDPR could implement a feature switching it back to dedicated PhysX cards, I would be a very happy camper, but until then i'll be a bit angry

I wish we could get even more PhysX Particles.. such as smoke/debris/embers when using Igni.. GPU accelerated that is.

[Bob.]

Originally posted by CatherineCat:

Originally posted by Bob:

If CDPR could implement a feature switching it back to dedicated PhysX cards, I would be a very happy camper, but until then i'll be a bit angry

I wish we could get even more PhysX Particles.. such as smoke/debris/embers when using Igni.. GPU accelerated that is.

That would be great, particle physics look freaking beautiful. If they did implemenmt more particle effects maybe it look more like the 2013 trailers with those gorgeous effects.

[WolfEisberg]

Originally posted by Bob:

This is part rant part informative for people with PhysX cards
(Please note that i love CDPR and the world they've created in Withcer 3, but gosh with this whole graphics incident and now this PhysX situation I can't help but feel ticked off)

Informative:
-Witcher 3 has "PhysX"
-But its run primarily on the CPU
-Having a dedicated PhysX card will do nothing, it won't even be used

Rant:
So Witcher 3 has this beautiful "PhysX" system that honestly makes it look gorgeous, the problem is is that its not even run, primarily, on the GPU, it boggles me that Nvidiia would even say this is PhysX in the normal sense. And it really bugs me becuase i'm running the game on a 970, but I also have 770 dedicated to Physx just sitting there. If i try and turn on PhysX my FPS is significantly less, but i miss out on those awesome physics. Honestly it really pisses me off.

Please post if you agree, disagree, or to let me know on some point i've missed out on

Where can you turn on physx in the game?

[Bob.]

Originally posted by eisberg:

Originally posted by Bob:

This is part rant part informative for people with PhysX cards
(Please note that i love CDPR and the world they've created in Withcer 3, but gosh with this whole graphics incident and now this PhysX situation I can't help but feel ticked off)

Informative:
-Witcher 3 has "PhysX"
-But its run primarily on the CPU
-Having a dedicated PhysX card will do nothing, it won't even be used

Rant:
So Witcher 3 has this beautiful "PhysX" system that honestly makes it look gorgeous, the problem is is that its not even run, primarily, on the GPU, it boggles me that Nvidiia would even say this is PhysX in the normal sense. And it really bugs me becuase i'm running the game on a 970, but I also have 770 dedicated to Physx just sitting there. If i try and turn on PhysX my FPS is significantly less, but i miss out on those awesome physics. Honestly it really pisses me off.

Please post if you agree, disagree, or to let me know on some point i've missed out on

Where can you turn on physx in the game?

Its under video settings. I For some reason they call it "Hairworks". That's probaly why you never saw it. But its still PhysX

[WolfEisberg]

Originally posted by Bob:

Originally posted by eisberg:

Where can you turn on physx in the game?

Its under video settings. I For some reason they call it "Hairworks". That's probaly why you never saw it. But its still PhysX

Hair works is not physx it is actually Tesselation technology.

[MeowCats]

Originally posted by Bob:

Originally posted by eisberg:

Where can you turn on physx in the game?

Its under video settings. I For some reason they call it "Hairworks". That's probaly why you never saw it. But its still PhysX

Sorry but i have to correct you.. PhysX is hardcoded to run off the CPU..(or just forced, but there are no ini tweaks for this whatsoever) and cannot be disabled at all ingame. And Hairworks isn't really PhysX.. it's all about Tesselation as every single strand of hair is tesselated.. there are like hundreds of thousands of hairs being rendered with hairworks enabled. GTX900 series have 3 times faster Tesselation Performance than previous GPU's.. which most likely explains why 600-700 Series GPU's have even more problems running it at decent framerates :/

[WolfEisberg]

http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/guides/the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-graphics-performance-and-tweaking-guide#the-witcher-3-wild-hunt-physx

There is no on/off switch for Physx, it is always on. Physx is for dynamic cloth and destruction effects.

[Bob.]

Originally posted by CatherineCat:

Originally posted by Bob:

Its under video settings. I For some reason they call it "Hairworks". That's probaly why you never saw it. But its still PhysX

Sorry but i have to correct you.. PhysX is hardcoded to run off the CPU..(or just forced, but there are no ini tweaks for this whatsoever) and cannot be disabled at all ingame. And Hairworks isn't really PhysX.. it's all about Tesselation as every single strand of hair is tesselated.. there are like hundreds of thousands of hairs being rendered with hairworks enabled. GTX900 series have 3 times faster Tesselation Performance than previous GPU's.. which most likely explains why 600-700 Series GPU's have even more problems running it at decent framerates :/

Originally posted by eisberg:

Originally posted by Bob:

Its under video settings. I For some reason they call it "Hairworks". That's probaly why you never saw it. But its still PhysX

Hair works is not physx it is actually Tesselation technology.

My mistake, thanks for correcting me.
But the orignially argument stills stands about dedicated PhysX cards, and improved PhysX

[kaay]

New generation consoles use amd cards, this game was developed for consoles so in order to use physx they had to use the cpu, they had no choice since amd cards dont support physx.
SInce all multiplatform games are built on a single engine, the PC Witcher got this limitation too.
I dont understand why you are so upset about it, by now you should have got used to playing console games on the PC, thats what we've been getting for years.

[WolfEisberg]

I wonder how much difference there would have been in performance if they had GPU physx?

[MeowCats]

Originally posted by eisberg:

I wonder how much difference there would have been in performance if they had GPU physx?

I'm pretty sure the performance would be better on Nvidia GPU's.. and even more with Dedicated PhysX GPU's.. giving the CPU a bit of a headroom for the game.

[NZPorterDJ]

As Kaay above hinted at, if they forced PhysX onto the GPU, then anyone with a non-nVidia card would be screaming about the nVidia GameWorks Conspiracy! As it is, the use of PhysX in W3 doesn't really warrant a hardware implementation, and the CPU libraries are fast enough.

While I would also like to see more use made of the PhysX GPU tech in games, the truth of the matter is that what high-end graphical goodness we already have packed in there is already got our high-end hardware tapping out with everything on Ultra.

Originally posted by CatherineCat:

I'm pretty sure the performance would be better on Nvidia GPU's.. and even more with Dedicated PhysX GPU's.. giving the CPU a bit of a headroom for the game.

Most tests of adding an additional GPU for PhysX show a reduction in performance. PhysX has its own processing system in the hardware and is designed to work alongside standard graphics processing. Adding an nVidia card to an AMD system to handle PhysX is even worse performance-wise.

[Bob.]

Originally posted by kaay:

New generation consoles use amd cards, this game was developed for consoles so in order to use physx they had to use the cpu, they had no choice since amd cards dont support physx.
SInce all multiplatform games are built on a single engine, the PC Witcher got this limitation too.
I dont understand why you are so upset about it, by now you should have got used to playing console games on the PC, thats what we've been getting for years.

Even if it was developed for AMD cards PhysX has almost always been an optional add-on for games, not something mandatory like for Witcher 3. It could have been improved with a much greater level of detail if they added an optional option to allow it on GPUs.

And a note about why so many PC gamers are upset.
Yes almost all games are console ports to PC, but rthat doesn't mean that the PC version cant be made to much greater level of detail and fidelity than consoles.
The High-end PC fan base are very avid and vocal people. We spend literally thousands of dollars trying top build the most powerful computers in order to get the most beautiful expierence. Witcher was one of those bastions for PC gaming where it was significantly better than consoles. But with Wticher 3 it looks very similar to consoles.
And please note that most of us understand that if these extra features were added that we wouldn't be able to use them at first. But later on when we improve our systems we can still have the best expierence around. Its more about futureprofing than anything, similarly to crysis